Earlier, Russian Transport Minister Maxim Sokolov said that Cairo International Airport would be the first to open to Russian flights. It now has a new terminal, which will service flights arriving from Russia. Experts are to carry out security checks and draw their conclusions prior to recognizing the airport as safe for flights.

In one of his TASS interviews, Sokolov noted that a visit, which Russian aviation experts were planning to make early in September, would definitely not be the last.

Moscow and Cairo have been negotiating the resumption of air flights to the country since late 2015. Russia stopped all air flights to Egypt following a terrorist attack on board Flight 9268 last October. The Russian A321 passenger jet crashed some 30 minutes after takeoff from Egypt’s Sharm el-Sheikh, in an area 100 kilometers south in the city of Al-Arish, located in the administrative center of the North Sinai Governorate. The plane was carrying 217 passengers and 7 crew members. There were four Ukrainians and one Belarusian among the passengers, and none survived.

In November 2015, it was announced that the crash had been a terrorist attack carried out by using a homemade explosive device containing one kilogram of TNT. The Russian transport minister said back then that Russia would resume air flights to Egypt only after the country had improved security standards at its airports.